ArenaNet reveals the Jotun race of Guild Wars 2

ArenaNet has unveiled the latest race to grace Guild Wars 2, and those familiar with the first game, should recognize there giants.

According to the latest blog post from Ree Soesbee, since Guild Wars, the Jotun “fallen far from their state of grace, losing command of technology and magic they once utilized, and remembering their place as kings of the land only in legend and story.”

Soesbee said the team really wanted to bring the race to life with GW2, “particularly for the Norn areas of the world,” and show just how far this once might race has fallen.

“We wanted them to be more than ‘nasty customers with big clubs,’ and the way we chose to do that was to give them a long history—but a tragic one,S’ she wrote. “We wanted to make the ogres an old race and follow that with the Jotun, since the two species are interlinked. Giving the Jotun a history that had been lost—ruined by their own flaws—gives them a lot of depth and plays into the overall story of Guild Wars 2.”

In GW2, the race is taller and more intelligent looking than depicted in the art from the original Guild Wars, which “helps to better illustrate the race’s history and the fact that they are sentient, smart creatures—not rock-tossing droolers.”

“The primitivism we see in their clothing and weapons is a sharp contrast to the magical monuments located at their camps—and that, too, is deliberate, ” Soesbee continued. “Showing the decline of a race from power and civilization into primitivism, all because they could not stop fighting amongst themselves, is important to the game’s theme.

“It illustrates what might happen if the player character races can’t give up their old arguments and unite against the threat of the Elder Dragons.”

Check out the Jotun in the gallery below.

Guild Wars 2 will go into open beta this spring and will launch in 2012.